With a sigh, Kavya nodded toward the empty space where the door had been. “Can I go now? Sye is waiting for me.”
Ruby tuned them out, throwing up a hand in goodbye and turning to Jonah. “You good? You’re pretty quiet for someone I usually couldn’t beg to shut up.”
He blinked at her, snapping out of whatever haze he had been in. Handing her the expandable faucet from the sink, he attempted a cocky grin that made him look like a depressed clown. “Forget sometimes how quick you thermies are. She could’ve killed all three of us before you even got here.”
She accepted the faucet, exchanging it for a paper towel. The bleeding on his arm had slowed, but soaked through his white shirt. “There’s a lot of ‘could haves’ in life, it’s probably better not to dwell on them. Plus, she didn’t.” She flicked the water on. “Time to find out why.”
The cold water slapped Greta in the face, dripping down her chin and onto the granite counter. She spluttered to life, coughing and groaning. Ruby tossed the nozzle toward the sink.
“The TCA will be here in twenty. Please try not to destroy my apartment any further in the meantime,” Lucas pleaded, gliding out of the front door.
“Hi again!” Ruby slapped her palms beside Greta’s thighs. “My sidekick and I have a few questions for you.”
“I am not your sidekick,” Jonah protested.
“Then you are…her boyfriend?” Greta asked.
The bark of laughter that flew from Ruby’s lips startled everyone in the room. Unladylike, loud, and complete with a snort at the end, her amusement could not be more obvious. Maybe in a different life. With a different end to their months spent together.Maybe, if he hadn’t been an asshat andpretended to not know her. Maybe if she became human once more and he was the only man left on the planet and she was really, incredibly lonely, but only if the electricity ran out and all the libraries disintegrated and—
Jonah rolled his eyes. “No, we’re coworkers. But that doesn’t explain who you are.”
Mascara ran down Greta’s cheeks with every blink, water clinging to her lashes and smudging the makeup. “Edward didn’t mention you.”
The room dropped ten degrees.
“But he mentioned me?” Ruby didn’t understand why it surprised her, but it did. Edward had also told her name to the farmer. Four years of searching, assuming he had forgotten her, only to be sought out twice within a week.What the hell was happening.
“He has a message for you.”
Sirens blared in the distance. They wouldn’t reach the apartment before the TCA called them off.
Jonah shifted in front of Ruby, partially blocking her from Greta’s view. “What does he want from her?”
Greta grinned. “He’s waiting.”
“For?” Ruby leaned around Jonah, nudging him to the side.
“You.”
If Ruby clenched her jaw any tighter, her teeth were going to shatter. This was a pointless waste of time. Was that what Edward wanted? Was he distracting her from something else that was happening?
“I’m going to shatter your collarbones.” She ripped open one of Lucas’s cabinet drawers and grabbed a rolling pin. “Want to elaborate before your shoulders are Jello?”
The threat only made Greta laugh. Hints of golden capped teeth flashed in the fluorescent kitchen light. She shrugged. “He said you’re not ready. But when you are, he’ll come find you.That he looks forward to seeing you again soon. And to not make him wait too long, or he’ll have to push harder.”
The sirens cut off in time for the group to hear the dining room table finally collapse from the couch. Its thud echoed through the apartment.
“Sorry, just one thing that’s been bothering me.” Jonah reached around Ruby, turning off the still spraying water and turning to Greta. “Who the hell are you?”
She leaned back on her hands, crossing her dangling feet at the ankles—the picture of nonchalance. “A follower.”
“Of what? Edward?” Ruby narrowed her eyes. “Why? What could he possibly have to offer you?”
“An end.”
Car doors slammed outside. Jonah glanced toward the door. “An end? That’s what you call this suicide mission he sent you on? You came here, to a TCA agent's apartment, knowing they would capture and kill you?”
Greta tugged at her hair. It came off in her hand and she tossed the white wig into the sink. The pale locks soaked in the pooled water, sticking to the metal sides. “I was dying anyway. Stage four thyroid cancer. Working at a coffee shop for health insurance to get pain pills. He took away the pain. And now at least my death will have meaning.”
